Matt Kahn on Leading with Love

him here to crack open our hearts and mind. So care we go sing that say me, Hello, my friend Matt Con. Welcome to the Holy Human podcast. Thank you well, thank you for having me. It's an honor to be here. Absolutely, I'm so excited about this conversation because we when we talk, I always feel like we have such beautiful conversations and you have such deep wisdom to share. So I'm excited for the listeners to get to hear you and and

here it comes out today, so well, thank you. It's you know, it's funny because as I have been throughout my career channeling and just letting it come through, um, I get to hear everything for the first time as everyone gets to hear, so it's always a nice little discovery. That's interesting. I wasn't expecting to start here, but you just said channeling, which I find so interesting. How would

you explain channeling to people? I think that channeling, you know, for a lot of people as artists, because within every being as an artist, so whether we have moments of inspiration or the gut instinct of a parent, or I just know something spontaneously and for me, um, and it happens in a deeper way where I've discovered this ability to where when I'm working with people are on stage, I just allow the universe or my higher self for my soul. However you'd want to call it to kind

of work through me and speak through me. You know, for a lot of people when they first started doing this, it feels like they're just, oh God, I don't know if I'm even making sense. Does it resonate? And is this nonsense? There might just kind of um, but really it's it's a process where we allow our highest wisdom to speak through us. And traditionally, in channeling, one would put their personality aside and let something come through. And for me, I'm I'm known as what's called an open

or embody channel where there is no moving aside. It's just on a clear space in which the wisdom and the love of the universe can pour through in the words and and even as people hear the sound of my voice, there's a healing energy that comes through. So I just I kind of live as just this connection between heaven and Earth and bringing um a powerful level of healing energy to help people during this uh, really uncertain time. I guess anybody can be a channel, and

I mean I know that I've channeled myself. I channel my music all the time, and when I'm on stage, like when I do move out of my own way. It's interesting because it's the only time I'll ever use the word perfection, because I feel like that's the only time I ever touch it is uh when I feel lost in not lost, actually I feel found in a

lot of ways. UM, But I feel like you're saying, like there's no there's no separation between the gift and what's moving through me and the experience and me as a human being in the moment, like it all becomes

one unified thing and it's a beautiful experience. I wish that experience for everyone do you feel like there's things that act like block your channel Over the last many years, UM, for the last twelve years, I've been living in this state of connection where you know, for a lot of people, they'll connect under certain uh situation circumstances, They'll bring it through and they kind of go back to their personal self to take their superhero cape off and then go

back to being, you know, just a person. For me, I live in this space and I had to go through a large amount of healing for many years to be able to do that. UM. In the meeting of my career, I was talking to someone and they said, oh, well you have to you know, connect in and connect out, and it just seemed like a lot of work. And I thought, the universe, I'd rather just live in the space and whatever I need to just embody this. I'd

rather take that journey. And you know, for all of us, you know, this type of experience is happening, is going to happen. A lot of types of people are channeling and they don't actually know it. It's but it's really just more about instead of thinking that what I need to change in my reality needs to happen under any

circumstances or any means necessary. The real question is which version of myself is doing the changing and the creating, and so channeling and spiritual alignment is really about getting to know and tuning in and connecting with the most infinite and powerful You. And as you become more in relationship with the most powerful You, that's when we start to see our perceptions of uh, the perceptions we have

our circumstances start to change. And when we realize is we don't actually need to change as much about our life as we think. We actually just need to learn how to perceive and relate to it from a different level of consciousness. That's what I find that a lot of your teachings, as I've followed them for the many years now, have helped me to to perceive life from a different perspective. And I would love to say that I live in that place every day, but I'm just

saying that to my husband. I was like, Oh, yes, all the beautiful teachings that I they, I do live from that space every so often. And then all of a sudden, I feel like, you know, you pop back into old ways and habits and just old grooves. I like to call them because I feel like those grooves have been They're so they're so groovy, they're so like,

they're so ingrained, they're so ingrained in us. And I know when I started on my healing journey, it was like I would have two days that would feel really connected, and then like eight days backwards, and then three days, and then it kind of goes back and forth, and eventually you start to the more the new grooves you know, start to UH to take place and take form, Like I started to live in those uh in a different

kind of perspective more often. And that's what your teachings for me, I think have have really helped create new grooves. And one of my favorite teachings that I ended up sharing on stage because I found it so beautifully heart ng was one where you had people UH say I love you to themselves and which, by the way, if you haven't done that, and I've I've watched people on stage, um grown men like, first off, look around, like, what the hell is Leon Rhymes having me do? I didn't

expect this at her concert? What did my wife dragged me to? And then all of a sudden, as they start saying it, they break down in tears, which moves me to tears on stage most of the time. I I just wondered if you could speak on why that teaching itself, why self love is so important for our evolution and how we find it amidst the shame and guilt that we all carry. Yeah, what a great question.

And you know when I saw you leave the I Love yous on stage, it touched my heart so deeply and moved me to tears just to see you know, that type of consciousness just permeating more of our world and being a part of a concert we stop and heal our hearts and just when you I just want to thank you for doing that. When you do that, it moved me. I actually thought about it last week just I always think about that. I just go it

really really was was quite life changing for me. And I think what you just to kind of simplify all of this is that when we're on a spiritual journey, we often want to know all of what the universe knows, and we're on a journey of looking for insight. Why did this happen to me? And all these kind of things, which is wonderful and beautiful, but on a heart center, path in which all my teachings come from. What we notice is is not about knowing what the universe knows. Right.

The universe is a cloud and it knows it all for you, and it brings you every file you need exactly when you need it. The real key to spiritual alignment is not do I know what the universe knows? Have I begun the process of treating myself and seeing myself the way the universe does. And so when we are loving ourselves, because as the universe source whatever you would call it, is made up of the energy of

unconditional love that we see as light. The more we love ourselves, the more we are saying I wish to know myself as the universe. I wish to receive all the love and support the universe always has for me. And I'm willing to make a shift to see myself more as the universe and less as the character. That

is a reflection of my family's need for healing. And as we love ourselves, we are literally giving permission for the door of the heart to open, and any wounds that are ready to be returned and cleared and healed just come pouring out through an emotional release. And so under and because of the laws of unity consciousness, because

we're all connected on the soul level. As we heal our hearts by loving ourselves, those I love use are planted as see needs of consciousness in every heart and existence. So imagine you just loving yourself to be a part of your healing journey, and grief pours out of your heart, or guilt and shame pours out. In that moment, you are not only sending love to every person in existence, but you're also helping to heal all of what you're healing in yourself just by loving yourself more, not less.

And as we continue to evolve under these most unprecedented times, we're living in truly an incredible time right now, the need for self love is only going to increase and become more important because it's the more we love ourselves that the more we're able to respond to others from place of compassion instead of a place of opposition. And this is really going to be the cornerstone of what

really helps turn our world around. It's interesting because I remember when I first started the whole self love journey, which, by the way I feel, is probably one of the ife not the most difficult piece of our journey, because I mean I still struggle with it depending on the day. I was like, what does that even look like? And what does that feel like? I know how to love other people? Or do I? I was actually started thinking or do I? Because do I really know what that?

What love is? How do people even know that they're loving themselves? I mean, to me, what I've learned, I guess along my way is that I give myself a lot more grace. What is self love? Along your journey? What does that looked like for you? And how did you know that that was opening more and more? That's a very interesting question. I think for me the word that that I have found for a lot of people's resident because love just as a just as a word.

Sometimes we grow up in families where people say they love us and they do very hurtful things, or we are trying to be loved by someone who is shut down in their own lives, and as children we often say, well, what do I have to do to earn their love? And then if we don't receive that, we feel like

we haven't done enough to earn it. And there's in so many levels of the subconscious mind there are so many associations to love being a form of reward and a lack of love being a form of punishment, And with parenting and children, it can get very confusing when you're trying to shape the lives of young, impressionable minds. And so what I like to use as a word is support. So you know you're loving yourself when you're

taking a more active role in supporting yourself. So, for example, let's say you had a day and it didn't go your way. From the egos point of view, it doesn't want to love itself because it doesn't want to spend more time as an unpopular character and its own perception. But in our soul we say, my god, I've had such a rough day. Isn't this the time that I

need more support than ever before? More so, we really want to break the spell of love being a reward for good behavior and the absence of love being a punishment for inappropriate behavior. We want to be able to say, as I support myself more, which could be I encourage myself to pursue my dreams. As you said, I give myself grace when I'm not my best and my highest, and I always give myself words of encouragement, I show

myself gratitude for all that I'm doing right. Support for me is is a more resident, practical term of of of self love, because again we can rope in love with romance and all these other things, and how do people just lie there and love themselves? And it really is just I am aspiring to be the most active supporter and encourager in my life, and I'm here to allow myself to know that things are going to be okay because I'm here with me. I love that word

support in the place of it. Yeah, thank you. That actually brought me so much clarity. I was like, oh, what feels good. You know. One of the things I love about your teachings is that you um you try, you try and teach so that we are unable to use the teaching itself against ourselves, which I find genius and I'm sure, as you know, all of our human, beautiful human minds can find a way, we will find

a way to use it against ourselves. Can you talk about in what ways do we use these practices against ourselves? And how can we grant ourselves more grace with these practices and utilize them for our own healing instead of our own self flagellation. Basically, yeah, that's a great that's a great way of saying it. I think a lot of times, you know, when people are meditating or doing these things, I think it really comes down to our intention, like why am I doing this? Am I really doing

this to heal myself? Am I doing this to deepen my relationships with myself so I can be a better partner in my relationship, a better supporter from my friends. And I think, really what's amazing is, you know, these really unprecedented times, As much as we can say these are very unpopular times, I think it's really amazing that it really puts us in a position to really focus and clarify our intention, you know. And I think there's a lot of teachings, and it's not the teachings fault

necessarily that we tend to use against ourselves. It's almost like a punishment, like I need to whip myself into shape, or if I'm not the exact version of myself, I need to be what do I need to dig out

inside of myself? And it tends to be a little bit of of a judgmental way to try to improve ourselves where really what we're looking to improve is if I can improve the quality of how I support myself, if I can improve the quality of how I talk to myself, if I can improve the quality of how I embrace and honor all parts of myself right, not to justify, but just to honor. You know, within all of us are going to be strengths and weaknesses and imbalances.

And if I can start to have a more thoughtful, loving relationship with myself, then the way I see others is going to change, and that's going to cause new experiences to enter my reality. And so I really think that on a heart center path, one of the greatest things we're learning is we're not punishing ourselves with spiritual work. It's actually a gift, and we need to learn how

to approach ourselves. Like if we went to a spa and you have some sort of a person that who greets you with the soft voice and says hello, welcome, this is your day of nurture. So if the work you're doing on yourself doesn't feel like a day at the spa, we're probably going in an unhelpful direction. Ah, why we all just dream away at a day at

the SPA. At this moment, we'll take a break and we'll be right back with more heart center, direction and guidance with Matt on right up this Welcome Back Loves. We were just talking about self kindness in terms of self care. I know for my own self, that's the way I was taught. We all have been. It's like, you work hard, and you there has to be the voice in the head that continues to tell you, but basically brate you, so that you can prove to it that you're doing a great job and you know, and

it's there's never the softness. How do we begin to stay angered in the idea that everything is here to help us? How do we lean into that wholeness and the fullness of our our emotional experience and trusting the universe in that way. I think it's a great question, and I think you know, when we think about everything is here to help us, I think people immediately jumped to this perspective that says, well, if everything is here to help me, then then that means the greatest atrocities

I've ever faced must be okay. And then people find in themselves this resistance too. No, no, it's not okay, And so I just want to be able to say that when we're looking for everything is here to help us. Where we're really trusting a higher level of intelligent order, the universe, light, God, whatever work, consciousness, whatever resonates with

us that the characters in our lives don't. Even if a character in your life said, land, here's why I'm here in your life, it's still not the reason why they're in your life. Right. People are wonderful, and I love people, but we're all kind of these like little wind up toys, right, And there's a higher order that is putting wind up toys around other wind up toys for the purpose of what evolution is going to bring

to the surface. So I think that, you know, the really helpful distinction is knowing that as a ault of everything we've all gone through and will continue to face, we will always come out the other end better versions of ourselves. But it doesn't mean that pain, atrocity and abuse is okay. And I think that it's the same way people get caught in forgiveness that if I forgive someone,

it means it was okay that this happened. And there's an innocence in us that who experienced pain and abuse and neglect and all of these things that says it's not okay, and on a human level, it's not okay. And in fact, right now the world is going through such a massive transformation because the way things have been is so not okay. We're evolving to a vibration where

this no longer has to occur. And so I think that sometimes in the beginning, when we think, you know, people think, I don't want to open up to the benefit of an experience that I've decided was not okay, abuse of and took advantage of me, And so I think we just have to kind of approach it with softness and say it's not okay that this happened. And yet, no matter whether I like what happens or I hate what happens, I'm always going to become a higher version

of myself down the road. And if I can learn to love and support myself through these experiences, I'm going to wind up becoming that higher version sooner, and I'm gonna embody in a deeper level, and I can shine a light that helps to heal other people so that none of these things that are not okay continues to occur, and in that evolution, there's a lot of death in that evolution, and I think we're all going through some massive amounts of of death in this moment in time.

I heard you speak on this a bit the other day. I was wondering if you could speak on why it's so important for us to come to terms with death and dying um while we're still living. I think when we face death before death finds us, you know, so to speak, that's what awakening really is. Where you actually experience the death of the old you, but you're not leaving your body. You're not going to the afterlife quite,

You're just going through a psychological death. And some of us experience that we change careers or when we become comparents, UM. But you know, really we're always experiencing some form of death because things begin an end, things are gained, things are lost, Everything that comes will go. And and as we really make peace with death, what we allow ourselves to do is really see that death as a doorway

into rebirth and renewal. We are constantly in a flux of change, and if we are going to find comfort in needing things to be a specific way, whatever that is, how we define ourselves. That's refined ourselves really clinging and scarcity and really lost in survival mode. And what we ultimately learn to do is we find our comfort in change,

not trying to find comfort while we change. And what's amazing is the difference between someone who is scared of change, someone who knows what needs to change, but is you know, afraid of the daunting task of implementing it, or someone who thrives in an environment of constant change. The difference between all of that is simply how you treat yourself.

And I think as we start to really see and and and unearthed, wow, like my perception of fear versus excitement is the difference between how I love myself or don't love myself. The difference between me seeing something from one perspective or another is really determined by how open I allow my heart to be. And so these are really really crucial times we're living in because it gives us a chance to practice this under the most incredible circumstances.

And we're all right now living in a world where as a result of COVID and all these changes and social distancings and shutting down, and we're all waiting for the normal life to come back. The world right now is in a collective grief cycle, and so we are mourning the loss of what used to be, hoping what used to be comes back, trying to negotiate what do

I need to do to get it that way? And really, I think, you know, teachings like this give us a chance to stop and say, something in me is unraveling, something in me is dissolving, and it's my loving support that's going to address and hold space for the healing that I have a chance to be a part of. And as we do that, the world starts to heal differently. We don't have to have as much violence and upheaval

to distract ourselves from this rather uncomfortable unraveling. We can actually just say it is my heartfelt support that allows the healing of my heart and the transformation of the world to unfold miraculous sleep instead of intensely. And I think that's really the choice we're all starting to make right now. Yeah, I mean, gosh, I definitely feel like I don't think I realized how deep of a grief this whole world was going through until for me personally

the other day and um. Yesterday, actually, I was was on the couch for the whole day, and it was the first time I recognized I was allowing myself to grieve. It's not like if someone had to die for me to feel grief. There's so much that's dying. There's so many dreams that we've had a collective death that's happening. Um. You know, all of these uh structures in the way that we have created life on this planet are truly

falling away and in desperate need of it. Um. And I I've actually was by the way, it's really small, um exciting celebration for me, but I actually allowed myself to lay there and feel it yesterday, And I remember that end of the day, I was like, Wow, I don't think I've ever done that. I don't think I've actually ever fully tapped into that and will allowed the love for myself enough love to have a day where

I didn't expect myself to do anything else. And I think because of this go go go pace we've all lived in. I know I'm not the only one that feels like they can't they don't have the time to grief, Like we don't have the time to feel these emotions, and I don't think we have an option anymore, almost, is what it feels like. Um. I mean, I guess what you know, what you're saying, what I hear you're saying, is that we have an option and we have a

choice in the way that we treat ourselves within that grief. Um. But the grief is coming like, it's here, absolutely, And I think it's a great I think it's a great point to make when you talk. Where I get as a vision is I get a vision of like a swimming pool filled with tears, right, And this is the swimming pool filled with tears is human entities, unprocessed pain.

And the more we love ourselves, the more we like you so beautifully put find the courage and conviction to give ourselves the space too, you know, not just hide behind the masks of strength, but allow ourselves to go into the vulnerability, to go into the difficult emotions, to go into the spaces where you don't know what's going on, where you don't have the answers, where you don't have control.

And if you imagine the world like this, this swimming pool of tears, every tear that shed in the world drains this pool of pain slowly. But as each of us start to wake up in consciousness and love ourselves enough to say, I'm going to allow processing my emotions to be just as important as anything else I do in the world. And you sat there all day and just cried and let it out, let it out, that pool drains faster, and we get to a point where humanity heals faster, so instead of just a tear being

shed by infinite people and that process happening slower. So many of us, as empathic, heart centered beings, are not just purging our experience of grief, but really what we are is we are purging the grief of the world. And even as you wake up in consciousness in the beginning, it's all about you are trying to heal your wounds.

And then at a certain point you realize, oh, it's just my experience of humanity's wounds, and it takes on a much more global process, and it's actually easier to face your feelings when you realize what you're healing is your history of experience, which is just your contribution to what humanity is healing as a whole. I love that, and I think it's the first time because I feel like I've been healing my wounds for a long time, um,

and I'm sure a lot of us have. It's the first time I'm really seeing and feeling into how deeply we are connected to one another. When it becomes less about our own solid you know what feels like such a solid mass of our own pain, we realize that it's not just this block that lives within us, but it is something we are truly tapped into with one another.

The empathy grows and it's a beautiful thing. Well, and I think you know, for anyone who's listening to this right now, you know, as an experiment, notice how when you think that what you're healing is yours, you're less likely to face it. You have more in patience as to how long you're willing to feel it, and you're often distracted by who do I blame and what do I need to fix in order to change this because we're still perceiving like a punishment versus a reward of healing.

And then on the opposite side, notice that when it's not necessarily yours, but your experience of what you're healing for humanity, notice how there can be more of an openness to feeling what we don't normally allow ourselves to feel. Notice that we can actually go deeper into the feeling when it's not necessarily mine, but it's our healing at hand. And I think that's a really interesting distinction, because a lot of us want to do the healing, but it's

just it's so difficult. And I think it's difficult because the memories that these emotions represent were during times when it was your life, your fault, your devastation, your heartbreak, your resentment, you know, your neglect, all these things, and and and as we love ourselves, it becomes strangely less personal. And when it becomes less personal, we're able to be

more present with the intensity of emotion. And then when we're interacting in the world, when we have a better relationship with emotion, we can be there for other people and take less personally the way or people may respond and act as a result of not knowing the depths of the healing journey they're in. M Yeah, And you know, we talked so much about pain and grief on this side, I want to talk about the opposite of it. And I think you have such an interesting view on happiness

and I happiness. It's such a touchy word because I feel like we've all been for our whole lives. We've been told to, you know, chase happiness, and like happiness is going to be the end all, and once we get to happiness, like everything will be fine and you know, there will be normal pain. And how we go about looking for happiness in our lives has been, like I said,

it's been a chase. And I think you have such a beautiful outlook on what true happiness is and how do we start to tap into that joy in the midst of all of this grief. It's such a great question to ask. So we all have different ideas of happiness, and a lot of us say, Okay, when I have this career, when I have this in my bank account, when I have this relation ship, I'm going to be happy.

And I think what's really funny about happiness is if you really play out what you think needs to change in order to be happy, you know, everyone would play out different details. Maybe I'd have a different car, you know, whatever, The tails are a different relationship out of all this stuff, right, Imagine he had all the money in the bank that you think you need and if people play it out

long enough. What I think is really funny is that the fantasy of happiness is I would have all of these things so that finally I could be left alone. And I think what's really funny about happiness is the fantasy of happiness as we all want the right to

afford being left alone. And yet when we love ourselves, we're kind of no longer picking at ourselves, and we're actually giving ourselves the actual fantasy we really want, like kind of like someone who doesn't have a job and then gets the career opportunity of a lifetime, and now everyone's pulling at them and they have all these were sponsibilities, and now they get to fantasize about going on vacation

and being left alone. Like everything comes down to what we really want is the right to be left alone. So we'll look at us though right now we've been we're being left alone, like we are alone, like literally, and nobody's happy, and the universe is looking down going, why aren't you happy? That's all you wanted was to be left alone. Now we call it social distancing, right, and understand what you want. People. It's a really funny

thing that when you love yourself. It's both. I spend more time saying nice things to myself and I'm not picking at myself, so I really leave myself alone. Either there's no inner critic and we give ourselves. What we really want is we all want to be left alone with the fantasy that nothing will be taken from us, which you know, but it's it's a very funny thing

to think about. Um, you know what I have found in my life as far as happiness and I've I can remember since I started school and meeting other kids and you know, all that kind of stuff. I remember feeling the intense pressure of like everyone is working hard to be the most popular kid in school, right. I remember being a young, like little politician, like trying to make sure everyone likes me and trying to make sure

no one's against me. And if I hear rumors about me, I got to spread more truthful ones and all this stuff and I actually found in my life, and this happened spontaneously, that the nicer I was to other people, especially if they weren't nice to me, the happier I was. I found personally that my sense of happiness is determined by my level of politeness. And it's not based on what people are doing. It's it's based on my respect

for myself. And as I kept experimenting with this throughout my life and kind of geeking out on politeness, like I'd even meet like a little a little boy and I'd say hello, sir, I am, and that's what I do because it's just I find that being polite and genuine has been this incredible force that is ripped my heart wide open, and it has created this level of power in me where even when the world is going crazy,

it doesn't lower the quality of my behavior. And that's really when you're totally free, is when your behavior is

not determined by the behavior of others. Well, that's a teaching that I feel like I could use against myself for me because I feel like it's interesting because that's it's almost when I feel like I've used against myself and my whole life because you know, I'm from the South, and it's like, you know, we were we were told we say yes, ma, I'm and no sir, and it was like but it was it was from a different place.

And I think you're going this circles back to your intention, you know, of where is it coming from and why am I doing it? And I what I love is that what I heard you say is your own respect for yourself. And I think that's key, um, because I think sometimes we can hear things like that and be like, Oh, I'm just gonna go around and be a lot nicer

to everybody. But then are you then taking your anger and your all of the things that happened to you maybe that you come up against, you know, you using that against yourself, Because I think that's really as I sit here and think about that, that's basically what I've done my whole life is like, Oh, we were taught to be really polite to people, but and that also meant like not speaking up for yourself sometimes and all

of these other things. And I find and I agree with you on this um that I have found for myself to you know, being in this business um for so long I've had I've had so many people say about me and to me like she she's always so kind and so and I really take pride in that because I've and I've found, like you're saying them more and the older I've gotten, I've learned to use that for for the good of all instead of having it come from a place where I feel like I can't

speak up and I always have to be kind or else somebody's gonna think bad of me. I mean that's how That's how I was raised, and it's um but for me, it's I totally feel you on that is that that's how I want to treat people like I want to leave. You know, it's like leave the world better than you found. It's like I want to I

want to leave people better than I found them. And I think that's such a beautiful place to live from all right, when we returned from break, we'll have more thoughts on making the world a happier place for all of us. Hello everyone, We were just us talking about the transformative power of politeness and kindness, and it also takes us out of ourselves, right, I mean, it takes us out of our own quote unquote ego and puts

us into a connection with people absolutely. And I think you know something that you pointed out or you know, touchdo I think is really helpful is the difference between politeness and subservience. Right when we're children, you know, I was subservient to my parents demands, and my parents also I wasn't raised in the South, but I was raised in a very emotionally volatile Jewish family. Um, what I learned from my parents, which was wonderful, is they still

to me like Matthew, you must always be polite. And it was more taught to me in this very acoustic way where um, the fear of what my mom would say was worse than anything I could face. And my mom was lovely, but it's a little judge duty badass, and uh, I was less afraid if people are more afraid of my mom. But what's interesting is, you know, and then people project that parental relationship onto the universe.

And so subservience is when you're trying to do a certain thing to avoid a certain amount of discomfort or punishment. Politeness is, you know, even we have to speak up for yourself. There's just a level of respect we hold, you know, where as an adult, even if you're talking to a child, you know, a child's experience is just to be fully present with whatever in impulse and instinct is coming up right. There's no think before you speak.

It's just all kind of running the show. And as adults we kind of learned to be more mindful and

more mature in the way we handle things. Not always, of course, but I think really politeness is just one of those things where we remember, like, and I remember from me what clicked about all this was actually the opposite, was like, if someone was not nice to me and I was not nice to them, I started to see it as a form of manipulation, and I started to realize I don't I don't want to be manipulated by someone else's um experience, and that it wants to be

forced to just kind of have this ping pong and reflect back to someone, well, they treated me bad, I'm going to treat them bad. And it just kind of woke up out of that, you know, spontaneously. And so for me, politeness is just my way of being able to say, we're all on our journeys. We're not always gonna hit the mark, but I'm always going to respect that there's a soul inside every heart, including mine. We're

always doing the best we possibly can. And if we can treat others with more respect, we help others bring to the surface more of their highest quality so that more people can thrive and less people have to suffer. And so I think for me. The politeness comes from very deep awareness that I came here to help resolve the suffering of the world, and it's and it begins with myself and who I interact with, one person at

a time, despite the all I play for the world. Yeah, I feel that so deeply, and if only we can we can remember that on a daily basis. It's like joy is found in that connection and into making for me at least in making, you know, and helping others to find that that light within themselves. I mean, this is honestly why I started this podcast was like, how do I how do I help people out of suffering? You know, it's um how do I help people be okay with with the wholeness of the fullness of who

they are? And you know, and what I have found is my deepest joys are when I'm doing that, you know, when I'm serving that role um or serving the role that I'm here to play in helping to liberate people and to connect people back to themselves and I and it's funny that you you talk about intention earlier, like that's been my my biggest practice has been coming back

to that intention. And once I got really clear on what that was anytime I get lost, like wunning to mounting, time I go down, like the dirt path that I'm not supposed to be taking, I seem to be able to connect back to that intention of of my why has been such a huge anchoring piece, I guess for me,

especially during these times. And I love that because I think the word service such a powerful word, you know, And I think sometimes people limit service to what I do at work, or we're having a canned food drive, and I think there's ways in which we kind of put service in a very interesting box. And I think for a lot of people, we don't often think of I speak as a form of service. I listen as a form of service. I respond not because my ego wants to have the final word, but because I am

in service to the person I'm in front of. And sometimes it's easier to forget about that service when you're around someone who's not acting in a way that is serving you. And so I think that as we love ourselves, and as we get more spiritually aligned, and we get more quiet and go within and we we we start to strengthen our ability to listen to the same degree

that we're also anxious to share. I think we start to remember that what I'm choosing for myself, how I speak to others, how I listen, what I do is not just to fulfill my personal desires. It's a service that I offer to all. And I think that the words service helps us remember that there's a greater reason why we're here, and there's a greater opportunity in every moment when we remember the service that is really all of us living for the well being of all. M hmm.

I love that I do something with every guest of mine on the podcast called the Holy Five. Of course, I love music, and I'm very much connected, and I know I love that you music to which I'm is excited to ask you this question. I just wanted to dig into your playlists a little bit and see if there's, like, there's five songs right now that you're loving, or five songs that speak to your life. However you want to play this game? What are your top five that you're into?

What a what a fascinating question. I love that because I'm such a big music fan. You and I talked about all the time, and you know, we just came out of the holiday season and I was raised Jewish, right, But I love Christmas. I love Christmas. Christmas for me is the end all be all, Like my heaven will

just be Christmas every day. And I've also thought about this over the years, and it sounds kind of morbid, but I always think of like if I'm writing the Escalator from Earth to Heaven, like what song do I want to listen to? I like that, you know what I mean. I don't know. I think about these things. It's covid up at home, and you know, what else do you think about other than why am I not wearing pants? But the songs I would say that touched

me the deepest, so many different genres I love. Okay, so, um Gabriel's song by Sting whatever album that was amazing. So gabriel song by Staying, I think, is just like this holy I'm in the presence of God and I am writing this Escalator to Heaven and it's all good. Okay, Okay.

So I was a kid and I was in you know, you have a school assembly, which is cool because you don't have to be in school and you get to go to the auditorium and you watch the other kids who are in the choir singing the Christmas songs with like a token Honakah song just to remind us that Hanika's music program is so deficient. Can we really ride

on Adam Sandler for that long? Really? So anyways, I'm watching these Christmas songs and and I'm like in fifth grade, and I hear a song that elicits a reaction to me that I'm literally about to explode into the most explosive tears. And I had to go outside because I didn't want to make a noise and embarrass myself, because I'm the kid gos to be popular, right, so so so this song and I went outside and I literally cried, and it was this spiritual moment that I just didn't understand.

But um, I was just embarrassed that people would hear me because I was literally about to scream. And the song was do you Hear What I Hear? That song touches me on a level I can't even describe. And I've got like eight versions of it. I love that. Here's your favorite version of do you Hear What I Hear? My favorite version do you Hear What I Hear? Is um Andy Williams, Oh cool old school hear what a song song. One of my favorite songs of all time

dust In the Wind by Kansas Nice. It's just so random, the great I think that's that. That's like the song you Die Too. All they are is dustin. That's a good one. That's a good one. That's a really good one. Two more things to go. Yeah. As far as Christmas songs, you know there's it's It's Christmas. Tree Farm by Taylor Swift is one of my new favorite Christmas songs. It's just there, there's a magic to it. My heart is it Christmas to Farm where the people come to dance on.

Very good, but it's so good. He's still on the Christmas music and I love it. I have actually had Christmas music come on my playlist at the beginning this year and I don't turn it off, so oh never. And I will tell you the last one is anything by Josh Broban because I like to cook. And it's a little known fact that if you listen to Josh Broban while you cook, everything tastes better. It's it's a

Josh Groban song. Have You Cooked the Best Too? I will tell you that I've cooked remarkable levels of food to Josh Groban's Noel Perfect Snow. I love it. And I don't ever ask anybody this, but I know you're a huge chef. Do you have a favorite thing to cook? Do you prefer a recipe? I decided yesterday for some reason that I'm going to make different kinds of guacamole.

That's what I did yesterday, master guacamole. Then I have these little bowls and I would like to stir in different things, so I did, like, you know, roasted corn and green chilies is one of them. And one of them had like dice grapefruit and crispy kale, and oh my god, that sounds so good. Yeah. I recommend this for anyone in existence. Like and as I'm eating it, I'm realizing I think I'm now in analogamous relationship with guacamole. It's the best kind to be in. During COVID, I mean,

I love guacamole. And then yesterday it was like this deeper. I think I really think I like you, like you, Ga, I love it. Oh my god, I'm gonna have to do that very good. I love that. Thank you amazing. This was so fun. Thank you so much. Thank you for coming on this podcast. And oh, something I'm gonna do at the end of this podcast because of the I love yous, I am going to share a chant of mine, so thank you so much for coming on,

and I'm we're gonna I'm gonna chant everyone out. My ho my, it's my compass and my oh no way, my hoh. It's connected to totally my heart, my heart, my heart through little well blow this blowing my heart, my heart, my heart, my hot leading me home to

my deep snowing, and that ties up this episode. Thank you so much for being here as always, and please forward this heart centered message to someone you feel could benefit from hearing it, and of course I would always love to hear from you, so please leave me your

thoughts in a rating wherever you're listening. Bye. On our next Holy Human, We're going to dive into the interwoven male and female energies that connect and comprise us all with the wonderfully wise and super cool dude Rainier Wild I love his name m listen and follow Holy Human on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to podcasts.